Wake the Dead
by Rebecca Hb
Summary: A good Cursor can take the smallest inklings and gather the truth together in thimblefuls. Amara is a very good Cursor. Set after "First Lord's Fury" - SPOILERS.


**Wake the Dead**

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"So," Amara said, her voice barely above a whisper, "do you have a plan?"

Valiar Marcus studied the camp ahead of them through her windcrafted lens. It lay on the croach, comparatively near the edge but not near enough for his woodcrafting to get them any closer. A pity - he wasn't quite as powerful as Bernard but he seemed far more skilled with woodcrafted veils. "Hit them from above," he said finally. "If you take me up, I'll put a balest bolt through the one holding the princeps. Depending on how easily he dies, we go from there."

She shook her head. "Another day of whittling them down, and we won't have to go from anywhere."

"They won't let us play that game for another day, Lady," he growled. "They're already spooked from all the men we've made disappear. Now they're on croach - we can't disappear them half so well. They're also getting close to a few places I'd arrange to meet allies, if I were them. This is as good an opportunity as we're going to get."

Amara's eyes narrowed. Valiar Marcus was right. "So we go in there and kill them all."

"It has the advantage of simplicity," he said as he nudged her arm with his shoulder.

Amara disrupted the lens before she consciously thought about it. Then she blinked, a tiny unsettled prickle running down her spine. The last person to use her lenses like that had been Fidelias.

He'd liked simple plans, too.

###

Princeps Tavarus was delighted at being rescued and hugged Amara and Valiar Marcus both enthusiastically. "I was trying to escape," the six-year-old said solemnly, looking up at them. "I really was. But everything kept feeling wrong."

"It's all right." Amara smiled down at the boy's opalescent eyes. Shards of red and blue whirled in them, but for the most part, they were an endless swirling grey. Neither Octavian nor Kitai had been able to reassure anyone that was _normal_ for a Marat.

"Your parents are pinned down with trouble between the Canim ritualists and the Icemen," Valiar Marcus said as he cleaned off his knife. "They would have come themselves, but-"

"You didn't even tell them I was gone!" Tavarus grinned. "That's _mean_, Uncle Marcus!"

'Uncle?' Amara mouthed at the ex-centurion as she ruffled the princeps's hair.

She couldn't be entirely sure, but she thought she saw Valiar Marcus flush in the glowing light of the croach. Then he tucked the knife into his boot and stood. "We should be going, Lady. Ehren ex Cursori will have left as soon as our time-limit was up. Twelve hours isn't quite enough time for him to reach the First Lord and Lady, but we'll be racing them back to Appia."

Her eyes wouldn't leave his boot. The sheath was extraordinarily well-hidden. She wouldn't have realized he had a knife there if he hadn't showed it to her just now.

A lot of men kept knives in their boots. It was a useful trick, an ace in the hole.

Most of them didn't hide them as well as Valiar Marcus did.

Hadn't Fidelias-?

It's been fourteen years, she reminded herself sternly. Fourteen years since I palmed that knife off him. I can't possibly remember how exactly he kept the sheath on his boot, not after all that time and all those troubles.

"Lady?" His eyes met hers, and her heart nearly stopped.

They weren't Fidelias's eyes. She was sure of it. The light of the croach warped their color, but they had to be a pale blue. Like Fidelias.

But they weren't Fidelias's eyes.

(Tavi had said he always knew Gaius Sextus by his eyes, even when they were a different color and shape.)

"Right," she said with a lightness she didn't feel. "Octavian still can't beat me in a wind-race. Step close, Valiar Marcus, and Tavarus, if you could go with Marcus...?"

###

Valiar Marcus was ill-at-ease during their flight. Amara could more than understand that. As high and fast as she flew, it had to be terrifying to have no control, not even the illusory safety of an air-coach. The ex-centurion hid it well, but...

When they landed, Tavarus was fast asleep in his arms. Amara couldn't help but smile.

"I'll take him to his quarters," Valiar Marcus said, shifting the boy in his arms. "You'll want to greet the First Lord and Lady when they arrive. Show them a reassuring face."

Amara almost hesitated at leaving Tavaus with him. But Valiar Marcus had been at Octavian's side for the past six years, and longer in the field - long enough for more than a few unsavory rumors to come to her ears. Whatever else people accused Valiar Marcus of, they never questioned is devotion to the First Lord and the princeps.

"Of course," she said and strode past him. Cirrus billowed behind her, and it took only a small nudge to have him catch the winds around Valiar Marcus and Tavarus and bring them to her.

"Uncle Marcus?" Tavarus asked sleepily as the ex-centurion carried him into the palace.

"You're safe, Tavarus, you're home," Valiar Marcus said softly.

("Fidelias?" fourteen-year-old Amara whispered, waking in a warm tub.

"You're safe, Amara, you're home," her teacher said, holding her hand in the darkness.)

###

After she managed to calm Octavian and Kitai down, Amara found herself alone with the First Lord. Kitai had vanished in the direction of Tavarus's chambers, eyes promising death to anyone who got between her and her son.

"Thank you, Amara," Octavian said, reaching out to take her hand. "You've done so much for my family over the years - I don't think there's any way we can ever repay you."

"You could," she said, suddenly feeling very tired. She raised her eyes to meet his. "You could tell me who Valiar Marcus is."

She thought she saw something flash in his eyes. "You know who he is."

"I thought I knew. But I'm not so sure about the First Spear anymore. I bet if I went to find out where he was between his term along the Shield Wall and his appearance in the First Aleran, I wouldn't find any place Valiar Marcus ever lived." Her eyes drifted closed. "Please, Tavi. Too many people have died, too much upheaval has happened - please tell me Valiar Marcus retired to Phrygia or Ceres for those decades. Tell me the truth."

"I can't tell you what he was doing before he came to the First Aleran, Amara," Octavian said gently. "I don't know myself."

"Tavi, _please_. I have to know-" Sudden tears sprang to her eyes. She'd buried Fidelias years ago, assured herself he died somewhere in the Vord War along with his patrons. Now, after three days of a long chase with a man too like him, she was emotionally exhausted. But her sword-arm was still strong. "Is he Fidelias?"

"Fidelias is dead." Octavian took hold of her chin, bright green eyes meeting and holding hers. "He died in the Vord War. He was discovered impersonating a Legion officer and crucified. Do you understand me, Lady Amara?"

Her mouth went dry. "I understand, First Lord."

"Valiar Marcus has served me and my family well, Amara. Don't forget that."

"I won't." She felt hollowed out by the emotions of the past few days. This was a scar torn wide open, a scar she hadn't realized existed. She was too exhausted to bleed, and Octavian wouldn't let Fidelias bleed for her.

Fourteen years ago, he betrayed her and the Realm.

Fourteen years ago, she'd been a girl doing her graduation exercise for the Cursors. Gaius Sextus ruled in Alera Imperia with no heir. Octavian was a shepherd-boy in Calderon Valley, Kitai a whelp in the Gargant Clan of the Marat.

A lot had happened in fourteen years.

Maybe Fidelias had died.

**-End-**


End file.
